


She Tucks His Hair Behind His Ear

by sasha_b



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-08
Updated: 2011-10-08
Packaged: 2017-10-24 09:51:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,208
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/262117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sasha_b/pseuds/sasha_b
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Erik hides in plain sight.</p>
            </blockquote>





	She Tucks His Hair Behind His Ear

**Author's Note:**

> This is based on the deleted scene where Erik sees the mother and the little boy in the airport in Argentina.

He can see the mother and the little boy in his mind’s eye; she’s dressed impeccably, he’s watching her as she stares at him, smiling and tucking his hair behind his ear with her long fingered hand. The airport had been more than crowded, hot and sweltering, full of noise and light and all the things Erik can’t abide. He can slip through any throng, disappearing with the shadows with a thought, but that place – it had overwhelmed him. He’d watched the boy and the mother, unmoving as the crowd surges past him.

Too much sun, too many people, crowds and jostling and there was no place to find quiet, until he had reached the villa and had taken care of the business he’d gone there to accomplish. _Then_ there had been quiet, save the turning of the creaky ceiling fans and the dripping of the _blut_ from the pig farmer and the tailor. He’d finished his beer in the blessed silence, cool in his light clothing, hair sliding forward twice – his hand had risen automatically to shove it back. No reason to look out of control. Erik was _never_ out of control. That way laid madness.

(the mother squats in front of the little boy, tucking his hair behind his ear)

Erik stands still in the borrowed room at the mansion; Charles is somewhere upstairs, probably in the library, or talking to one of the children, or contemplating the reason Erik beat him in their last chess match. Or perhaps he’s lying alone on his bed, listening to the breeze drift in slowly through the thrown up sashes, heat still omnipresent despite the wind and nighttime.

The jacket Erik’s removed already, but he’s still wearing the turtleneck. He has several of them; they’re easy to keep neat and he doesn’t give a toss about clothing. Not until he’d arrived here, and seen the things Charles owns, and was reminded of a past he wanted to forget, but cannot, for it is seared like molten lava over his broken heart, anger and pain and empty all he remembers when he looks in the mirror and the closets and is reminded he doesn’t _have_ and yet he shouldn’t care about _want_ or things and –

Sweat trickles down his spine. His scarred spine, but he’s alone, and he crosses to the window in his room and throws up the glass pane, leaning out, breathing deeply, eyes closing. The boy and the mother rise up and he remembers the airport and how out of all the things he’d been thinking about and meaning to do, _they_ are what he recalls the best, not the blood and honor, not Shaw, not the Caspartina or the villa, but _them._ Them.

 _Are you looking for someone?_

 _…Aren’t we all._

“Give me strength,” he murmurs to the wind, although strength for which thing he’s not sure.

He stays in the window for how long he doesn’t know – until Charles’ voice infiltrates his consciousness, a tiny, slippery snake, the tongue tickling his ear. The moon is fat and low and Erik’s eyes don’t stray from it.

 _A game, my friend?_

“As you wish,” Erik says aloud, and without breaking thought or memory (she touches the boy’s hair, tucking it behind his ear) he turns and whips his too warm turtleneck over his head, his scars reflecting white and wormy in the light of the room and from the light of the waxing gibbous moon outside. He stands at the foot of his bed, where his small suitcase is open, and he pulls the white polo out that he’d worn in Argentina. It’s hot enough here for it, too, but he picks it up and holds it to his nose, shutting his eyes, breathing for a moment, still, quiet.

 _Sticky candy in the boy’s pocket, sweat sweet hair scent, the mother’s hand sliding gently through her son’s tumbled locks, his smile, so broad and loving._

His eyes blink open, and he finds them dry. As always. As always, since that day in the camp, when a single shot had ended his possibility.

 _Erik – are you coming?_

“On the way, Charles.”

He slips the polo over his head and tucks it neatly into the khaki slacks he’s wearing. Smoothing the shirt down, he stops once and looks in the mirror, checking his hair, making sure everything is ship shape and normal.

On his left arm the tattoo is completely visible, but he ignores it, as he doesn’t see fit to give attention to something the pig farmers and the tailors gave him. He will pay it attention when he needs it; it won’t go away, ever, and even if he had it removed, it would still be there, burned all the way through gristle and muscle and bone.

About six inches above the numbers one thin scar shows, coiling out from the short sleeve of the polo, dancing down his lean, strong arm, but he ignores that too. The camps taught him obedience, rigid control, and sacrifice, but they also taught him to not care about things that are of no consequence.

He takes the stairs two at a time to the library, where Charles is waiting with his brandy and his chess board and his never ending optimism.

The polo shirt causes the other man to raise his eyebrow, but he says nothing, merely pouring the brandy into two goblets and setting one down in front of Erik.

No fire in the grate since the heat outside is oppressive, but they sit in comfortable silence as they play, Erik eventually check mating Charles in a move that causes the other man to huff a snort and raise his hands in the air, giving in graciously. Erik smiles tightly and begins to clear the board, readying it for another round, his bare arm hovering over the edge of it as he scoops up white pieces.

Charles’ hand catches his left wrist as he reaches for the last piece.

Their eyes meet, and Erik remembers why he wears the turtlenecks as Charles’ face pinches, the impossibly red lips compressing and thinning as he widens his eyes, blue tearing into blue, the silence stretching between them, a melting clock oozing through its housing, catching everything in its path and dragging them all along.

Erik shakes his head, although he allows Charles to turn his arm over, the numbers up and pointing toward the ceiling. Charles opens his mouth, his sweater vest opening as he leans forward, the buttons clicking on the table that holds their game.

“Charles,” Erik says in warning. He’ll say it only once.

To his credit the other man does not flinch or move away, and gradually lets go of Erik’s arm. Goose bumps rise on Erik’s flesh and the fucking polo shirt is suddenly too cold, no matter the heat of the airport in his mind, the white hot sun, the crowds, the noise and the aching _everything_ and the boy and the mother.

He makes to pull back, but his hair slides over his forehead, messy, uncontrolled. He licks his lips and Charles’ hand, the one that had grasped his left arm, reaches up and tucks the strands behind Erik’s ear.

Erik closes his eyes.


End file.
